Spike glances around the room, then gives the signal. He flips the switch and everything goes black.
Big MacIntosh silently enters the room. Like Spike, he is dressed in black stealth gear. He has already incapacitated the guards – two of them, unicorns, distracted by the big buckball game going on in the field across the street and visible through the security room window. They never knew what hit them. A dim flashlight flickers on at the top of his hat as he creeps forward toward the exhibit. He gives the signal to Spike, who tiptoes over to the exhibit and carefully taps it three times, then breathes just a tiny bit of fire at the glass.
The alarm goes off and the two of them freeze. “You were supposed…to shut off…the alarm,” Spike says haltingly through clenched teeth.
“I thought I did,” Big Mac says through his own clenched teeth. He had certainly shut something off, though in retrospect he had to admit that he hadn’t been entirely sure what that “Off” button in the guards’ room had actually been connected to. For all he knew, it could have been a coffee machine or something.
Several moments pass as they try to decide what to do. If the alarm is only there to alert the guards, then they’ll still be fine. The guards will be out for a while yet. But if it alerts outside authorities…
Finally, Spike exhales a long breath. “Let’s get back to work,” he says. “Double-time it.”
Big Mac lowers his foot, which has been raised ever since he froze, and nods. If more guards are coming, they’ll be caught and punished in the same way regardless, so they might as well try to finish what they started. He shakes off the black saddlebag on his side and reaches into it with his mouth, pulling out a joke book.
Flipping through the pages, he soon finds one that he thinks is good and chuckles to himself. “Why was six afraid of seven?” he reads.
“Because seven ate nine,” Spike says, exasperated. “Come on, you’ve got to do better than that. Everypony knows that one.” He glances around the room, the alarm still blaring but nopony yet in sight.
Big Mac frowns, flipping through the book once more. “Oh, I don’t know what you’d think is funny,” he says. “Why didn’t you just pick one out?”
“If I see the punchline too early, I won’t find it funny enough and my laugh fire won’t be as hot,” Spike replies. “Didn’t you pay attention when I was going over this?” He sighs. “Just use the backup.”
Big Mac pulls another item out of the saddlebag, a long phoenix feather. Spike closes his eyes and braces himself, and Big Mac starts to tickle his stomach with the feather. At first, Spike reflexively resists, nothing much happening aside from slight snorts and a bit of smoke coming from his nostrils. Then he can’t hold it back any longer. He bursts into laughter and breathes incredibly hot fire onto the glass, which begins to melt. A minute later and a hole has formed, just big enough that he could put his arm through it. Another minute and the entire side pane has become an oozing mess on the floor.
Big Mac stops tickling Spike and Spike re-composes himself with a few coughs. “Okay, we’re in,” he says. After one more cough, he flies through the gap where the glass had been and takes the item – the Sphere of MacGuffin. After a quick glance-over, he nods to Big Mac. “Let’s go.”
As they turn to leave, the alarm shuts off and they freeze again.
Soon, a tall, rather un-ponylike form walks toward them from the distance. Big Mac and Spike each take a step back, readying themselves to run, but before they can do so, the new entrant reaches the glow cast by Big Mac’s flashlight. “False alarm,” the figure says with a smile. “Not literally, of course,” he adds after a pause. “But that was a pretty ‘cool’ entrance, don’t you think?”
“Discord!” Spike shouts. Then, realizing his mistake, he says more quietly, “You made it!”
“Of course,” Discord says. “Sorry I was late. Sunset Shimmer needed me to open a portal to her boyfriend’s house again and then I had to just stand there and wait until she came back.” He materialized a watch on his wrist and tapped it twice. “I’m not sure why I bother. Long-distance relationships barely ever work out.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Spike says. Then, remembering the task at hand, he says, “Did you turn the alarm off manually or just use your magic? Did you see the guards on the way in?”
“Now that you mention it, it was rather surprising that there weren’t any guards in the security room,” Discord says.
“What?” Big Mac asks. “But I took them out. They were still there, sleeping like foals.”
“Well, they must have taken themselves back in,” Discord says.
Just then, a voice shouts from a side entrance to the room. “Stop, nopony move!” One of the guards flips a switch with his magic and the room is instantly flooded with light. Both step into the room in full uniform.
“RUN!” Discord shouts, and after a quick glance at the guards, they all begin running. Discord creates a magical force field that temporarily blocks the guards from following them, and they make it through two rooms, the exit in sight, before Spike is suddenly lifted and pulled back by somepony’s magic.
“Go on without me!” he shouts, trying to toss the Sphere of MacGuffin toward the others but finding it impossible to do so.
Having stopped running when Spike was captured, Discord shrugs and starts walking away, then turns back again. “Just kidding,” he says. Big Mac is frozen in shock, staring at the pony who has captured Spike.
With a bit of effort, Spike manages to turn himself in mid-air to see that pony himself. “Celestia?” he asks in surprise. “Hey, welcome to Heists and Hijinks. I didn’t know you were joining us. How did you even know we were playing?” Like Ogres and Oubliettes, Heists and Hijinks is a popular role-playing game that Spike, Big Mac, and Discord have recently been getting together to play.
“I didn’t,” Celestia says, irritated. She takes the Sphere of MacGuffin from Spike and looks over it. Satisfied that no damage has been done, she levitates it back to one of the guards, who have managed to catch up in the confusion.
“Wait…what?” Spike asks, looking at Discord.
“Oh, this isn’t the game,” Discord says. “Remember? I was late. Naturally, I assumed you must just really want that Sphere.”
Spike opens his mouth, but finds himself speechless…and very confused. Both museum guards close in, along with several other guards who must have arrived with Celestia.
“Uh-oh,” Big Mac says.
The End
